[media-credit id=302 align=”alignnone” width=”495″][/media-credit] Ryan Massfeller, president of the Denver Metro Young Republicans, and Colleen McMillan, the group’s finance chair, help bartend at the DMYR’s holiday party this year.

[media-credit name=”Lynn Bartels” align=”alignnone” width=”495″][/media-credit] University of Colorado regents Stephen Ludwig, Joe Neguse and Michael Carrigan at the Denver Young Democrats holiday party at the Governor’s Mansion on Tuesday.

What’s not to celebrate when you’re a young Democrat? Your president won re-election and your party controls the governor’s mansion and both chambers of the state legislature.

There were smiles all around Tuesday when the Denver Young Democrats held their annual holiday party, attended by Democrats of all ages and other folks, too. Party-goers were asked to bring a toy for the Boys and Girls Club of Metro-Denver.

Among those present: Rep. Dan Pabon, sleep-deprived but madly in love with his 14-day-old son, Denver clerk Debra Johnson and members of the University of Colorado Board of Regents. Gov. John Hickenlooper addressed the crowd before dashing off to another event.

The Denver Metro Young Republicans are holding their holiday party Friday night at the Colorado Auto Dealers Association at 290 E. Speer Blvd. Attendees have been asked to bring an unwrapped toy for the U.S. Marines Toys for Tots program.

State Rep. Dan Pabon says it’s clear his newborn son already has some of his characteristics: the baby made a late arrival, not wanting to leave his comfy confines.

Alexander Daniel Pabon was born at 10:56 p.m. Tuesday with the following vitals: 7 pounds, 11 ounces, 20.5 inches. Doctors induced Heather Gwinn Pabon Monday after she was a week overdue. Then it was 27 hours of labor and an unplanned C-section before Alec finally arrived.

If the son picks up another of his dad’s characteristics, the younger Pabon is likely to get a nickname: “Smart Alec.” (See, Pabon’s numerous references to Mitt Romney during the 2012 session)

WASHINGTON — There were more Spanish language ads up in the Denver television market than any other city during the presidential election — with $4.1 million spent from January through Nov. 6 this year, according to an analysis by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Democrats and left-leaning special interest groups spending on behalf of President Barack Obama placed 4,725 television ads this year in Denver. Republicans and their interest groups placed 1,752 ads. Democrats spent $2.9 million and Republicans spent $1.2 million in Colorado.

Spanish language spending on the presidential race was largely confined to five markets including Las Vegas, Miami, Orlando and Tampa, according to Kantar Media’s CMAG, which did the analysis for the Hispanic Chamber.

Nationally, Obama’s campaign and his allies spent $12.4 million to place 15,355 ads while GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s campaign and his group allies bought 8,697 ads worth $9.7 million, according to tha analysis.

“There has been a great deal of discussion of how the Hispanic vote was the difference-maker in this election, helping President Obama carry key states like Colorado, Florida, Nevada and Virginia,” said CMAG President Ken Goldstein, in a statement. “There has been a lot of focus on how the campaign’s policies may have impacted that vote. But less commented on is the simple fact that one side delivered more messages on Spanish language television.”

He’s the toast of the pundit world, the whiz kid who nailed it this election, the Chuck Norris of Numbers, correctly predicting every state that would support Barack Obama for president despite a wave of “Nate Hate.”

President Barack Obama celebrates after delivering his acceptance speech in Chicago on Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2012. Obama swept to re-election, forging history again by transcending a slow economic recovery and the high unemployment which haunted his first term to beat Republican Mitt Romney.

Back in August, University of Colorado political science professors Kenneth Bickers and Michael Berry won national attention for projecting an Electoral College romp for Mitt Romney based on a model relying heavily on state-level economic factors such as unemployment data and changes in personal income.

On Wednesday — after the professors incorrectly forecast that Romney would sweep the battleground states that ended up carrying Obama to an easy victory — it was time for a reckoning.

“The model was wrong,” Bickers conceded. “Sure, that’s a mea culpa I suppose. I’ve argued everywhere from the beginning that polls and prediction models don’t vote. This gives you the historical conditions, provides a kind of baseline for information in interpreting what might happen. In that sense, I still think it’s a useful tool. It didn’t get the correct outcome but it does give you the historical context.”

If Nate Silver of the FiveThirtyEight blog is biggest winner of the election prognosticators by nailing all 50 states with his poll averages and “secret sauce,” then Bickers and Berry are among the goats.

And the battleground results truly proved their undoing. The CU profs wrongly put Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Colorado, New Hampshire, Iowa, Virginia and Ohio in Romney’s column (and Florida, in which Obama has a lead). They also had Minnesota — which Obama won by 8 percentage points — going for Romney.

Two days ago, state House Minority Leader Mark Ferrandino confided he thought Democrats would pick up three seats. Instead they likely picked up six.

Congressman Ed Perlmutter’s district was 4 percent less Democratic after redistricting, yet it appears he beat Republican Joe Coors by 12 percentage points, which is how much Perlmutter won by in 2010.

President Barack Obama took Colorado’s nine electoral votes in a race that was called much earlier than expected.

The Democrats who gathered at the Sheraton in downtown Denver Tuesday were deliriously happy, but also somewhat in shock. Their margins of victories were greater than expected. “Do you believe it? Do you believe it?” they kept asking each other.

Denver Mayor Michael Hancock Tuesday night is scheduled to appear as a guest on TV One, a national news channel targeting black adults, to about the Election Day turnout for Denver and Colorado.

Denver Mayor Michael Hancock, seen here at the Democratic National Convention in September, has been a visible presence during the campaign. He will be on a national cable news show Tuesday night to talk about the election. (Helen H. Richardson/Denver Post)

Hancock will be interviewed by MSNBC anchor Craig Melvin for the channel’s “One Vote Matters 2012 Presidential Election” coverage, joining other guests such as Marc Morial, president and CEO of the National Urban League; Benjamin Jealous, president and CEO of NAACP; and acclaimed actress Stacey Dash.

The full night of coverage will stream live on tvone.tv and theGrio.com.

Hancock has been a visible presence during the election, stumping for President Obama, traveling to the Democratic National Convention and welcoming dignitaries to Denver.

The mayor also has been campaigning for Denver residents to pass a de-Brucing ballot measure that the city says will bring in an extra $68 million to the general fund.

Joey Bunch has been a reporter for 28 years, including the last 12 at The Denver Post. For various newspapers he has covered the environment, water issues, politics, civil rights, sports and the casino industry.